Playing Scrabble
by Kaila.Nicole
Summary: Plunk. Scrip, scrip, scrip. Squish. Clink, clink, clink. Plunk. Squish. Sweets' new form of therapy aids Brennan and Booth to carry out some decisions they wouldn't normally make. And it has nothing to do with playing Scrabble. B&B. Two-shot.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: This is my first **_**Bones**_** fanfiction. That doesn't mean you should go light on the review if I truly don't write a successful fanfic, but please be aware that I might not capture the essence of Booth and Brennan in this one-shot. It may take me some time to adjust to Brennan's mindset, as I usually write sarcastic and witty characters and hardly ever point-blank characters. **

**As always, enjoy, and you know the drill: read and review!**

_Painted eyes and empty streets  
Are taking it down  
Selling perfect tragedies  
Without a sound  
Faded roses scattered on the ground  
I will be wanted  
I will not fall from grace  
Daylight has waited  
Just to live upon your face  
All that I wanted  
Has been right in front of me_

_Wanted- Holly Brook_

_Plunk_. _Scrip, scrip, scrip_. _Squish_. _Clink_, _clink_, _clink_. _Plunk_. _Squish_.

"Remind me again why we're doing this?"

"Sweets said it is a new form of therapy he wants to try out."

"Then why isn't he doing it?"

"He's busy."

"I think it's pointless." She eyed his form- muscular arms moving in procession with the paint roller, a sweaty symphony of grunting and muttering. Flecks of minty melon paint peppered his old, scraggly T-shirt that sported the Philadelphia Flyers logo.

"You think a lot of things are pointless."

"This one tops the list, then." His face was scrunched up, nose twitching from the thick scent of the paint. Even with the balcony of Brennan's bedroom open, he could still taste the denatured alcohol in his mouth. He brought his lips together and the soft popping sound of his wet lips filled the hush hanging between the two partners. "I like this color."

"Thank you." She could detect the miniscule- yet heavy- sigh he emitted. He was trying to make conversation and she wasn't helping. She was aware of this. But she also knew that they would work faster if they didn't acknowledge each other. Damn him, though, he made it hard when that frustrated look glazed over his features. "Listen, I know that you need to pick up Parker in a few hours," The words were rolling out like vomit. Unwanted and pointless, like he believed this paint job to be. Why was she trying to force him away again? For once, she had no answer. "So why don't you go home and clean yourself up-"

"And leave an amateur painter such as yourself all alone? I don't think so," Booth scoffed and she narrowed her eyes. _Uh-oh. Stepped over the line_.

"So I can travel to the filthiest, most disease-infested places on Earth but I can't handle painting my own room?"

"Bones?"

"Painting that is supposed to help us accomplish something together other than catching criminals and solving murders. Instead, you're making a huge deal about it. If you want to go-"

"Bones."

"-you could just leave because I'm aware this isn't your type of thing."

"Thing? What? When did I have a thing? Bones, hang on a second." The painter roller in her grip clanked on top of the drop-cloth covered hardwood.

"_What_, Booth?" His stoic expression melted into a sheepish smirk.

"You're, uh, leaning against the wall."

"I'm aware. Am I unable to do that now, too?"

"Wet paint, Bones." Recognition flashed across her face and Booth could see the hint of a blush spreading across her cheeks. She pushed herself off of the wall and the sickening slurp of the paint sticking to her cotton T-shirt sounded.

"Thanks." He smirked and she found herself smiling, even though- wasn't she supposed to be angry with him? It didn't matter. Her anger never lingered long with her partner. She didn't want to dig deeper into her subconscious as to why that was.

"Don't mention it." He watched her pick the roller back up and clean up the Brennan-shaped mark she'd left on the wall from her T-shirt. He tried to hide his grin as he eyed the honeydew-colored side of his partner. "I want to stay here." He swallowed the sarcastic comments that bubbled up into his mouth. Their eyes met and the paint rollers slowed to a pause, halfway up the wall.

"All right, Booth." The silence between the two now was more comfortable than the previous instance. A burst of sunlight lit up her bedroom, which began looking more inviting with every paint stroke and dip of a brush. She wasn't sure what moved her to choose green for her bedroom. Sure, the color was a significant contrast to what her bedroom had been before, but she wasn't positive that was the main reason behind her color decision.

Booth had suggested a coral blue- one of the many ranging shades in her irises, he'd said- but she declined. She needed something new and refreshing. When she'd brought the paint sample in to Sweets' office, he'd nodded, reading the selection simply as "Cucumber Green." That is was, but Brennan found that it was much more than the color of a simple garden fruit.

"_It's just a color, Bones." Booth quipped earlier that morning when she'd first cracked open the metallic cans. _

"_No color is just a color, Booth. The green I've chosen represents nature. It's a very calming shade. Brides in the Middle Ages wore green to symbolize fertility and hospitals paint waiting rooms green to calm down the patients."_

"_It just reminds me of that leprechaun we found in that ditch." The blank stare he had received notified him to keep quiet. He obeyed. _

"_He wasn't a leprechaun, Booth."_

"_How do you know?"_

"_We never found a pot of gold." _

"_We found those coins."_

"_No pot."_

"_Okay, so he was part leprechaun, how about that?"_ The green hand waving in front of her face awoke Brennan from her glimpse into the past few hours. The easy banter between Booth and herself was known for the common misconception that they were going to make out at the end. She hoped one day, it wouldn't be just a misconception, but it would be factual.

"Hey, Bones, you know that when Sweets gets here we'll have to be all… hunky-dory."

"I don't know what that means."

"It's like… splendid or sumptuous or another one of those words you like to use."

"I don't use splendid in casual conversation and it's certainly not one of my favorite words."

"You get my point."

"What do you suggest we do to convince Sweets, then?" His inner FBI agent warned him that her tone was mischievous, but this was Bones. Bones didn't do mischievous. He blamed the sudden change in her tone to the thick scent of the paint that must have found its way up her nostrils.

_Plunk. Scrip scrip_. _Squish_. He yelped at the sudden freezing liquid littering his entire backside. Neck twisting sharply, his eyes dove and searched, soon meeting the giant globs of paint on his lower back and ass.

"Jesus!" Brennan laughed, whacking her partner again with her paint roller and ducking quickly when he retaliated, globs of paint flying from his palms onto her clothes and her hair. She cried out his name, laughing as he came after her again, and dunked her hand into one of the cans, tossing the paint towards his racing figure.

"You're going down, Bones!" He tackled her to the ground and felt himself swoon as she laughed harder, rolling out of his grasp to pick up the paint roller and shove it in front of his face.

"Any last words?" Instead of finding some flimsy reason to plead for his life, his hand grabbed her leg, tugging her down on top of him. Yeah, he was pretty sure both of them had enough toxic fumes inside of them. Soon, the two were still and breathing hard from their fiasco, albeit covered in paint and significantly closer to one another than before.

"Bones?"

"Yeah?"

"I am," He paused and leaned in to brush away a glop of paint that had wound up on her cheek, "a very sore loser." Despite the fact that in the end, he had won, Brennan chose to forget all of that unnecessary information. She blamed it on the thick scents- his cologne and the paint- clogging her mental stamina.

"I believe I can help you with that."

\/

Late for a tennis lesson with Daisy, Dr. Lance Sweets knocked on Brennan's door. Again. Then again. And again. Letting out an exasperated noise, he pressed his ear to the door and strained to hear what he could only detect as paint sloshing and slapping.

"At least they're following my directions," He muttered and his hand went down for his cell phone only to meet his car keys. After cursing his bad luck, he tried the doorknob.

His eyes ran along the expanse of bookshelves, stocked full of anthropology guides, other scientific gatherings and ideas, and… a plastic pig? Then he heard the laughter. He moved quietly along the wall like any good FBI member- although, he had never once been taught how to approach a suspected crime scene. Somehow, the words "crime scene" and "psychiatrist" never even came close to being in the same sentence. His blood thickened in his veins and his heart began pounding at the idea of finding something interesting, even if this was just Brennan's house and the most exciting thing he could find would be Booth and her playing Scrabble.

"Dr. Bren-" The door to her bedroom swung open a few inches, revealing the two agents on the floor in a term that could only be described as being stuck together like glue. _Definitely not playing Scrabble_. Sweets opened his mouth again and the little anal-retentive angel on his shoulder shouted about codes and ethics while the other shoulder held a mini-Sweets, dressed in casual attire and smoking what he could only describe as some type of grass.

"Man, leave 'em alone. You knew this was bound to happen eventually." The angel on his left scowled, eyeing the other with distaste.

"And when you go to write a report of your experiment, I'm sure the director will be very pleased that your subjects ended up playing tonsil-hockey." Sweets shook his head. The paint fumes must be invading his brain already. Dr. Brennan and Agent Booth still seemed to be unaware of his presence and he was glad of this fact. If they knew he had caught them together, the awkward silences in his office would become even more awkward. If that was even possible, Sweets reminded himself and grinned broadly, content with his findings. He left the door where it had fallen open and backed out into the hallway, across the living room and locked the apartment door behind him.

"Mission successful," He announced to himself, picked his racket he had left beside her door, and twirled it around in his fingers, whistling complacently as he entered the elevator, the double doors closing on his cheerful form.

**AN: Not sure what Sweets' reaction would be to Booth and Brennan steamily making out, but this is what I hope it would be: him to keep his mouth shut and let them continue! Ha, ha. I hope you enjoyed this. Expect to see more **_**Bones**_** fics from me in the future. **


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Since people put this on story alert, I figured I would give into all of my e-mails and add another chapter. This will be only a two-shot, though, so be aware. **

**You know the drill. Enjoy, as always!**

"How did the painting go?" Sweets faced the two in his office the following Monday. He fidgeted in his chair, trying to keep his foot calm. _Stop shaking. Brennan noticed when Booth did it, she'll notice you too_. But she didn't. Sweets jotted this fact down before looking up at the silent couple.

"I thought it went fine," Brennan admitted, finally.

"Just fine?"

"Well, it helped Booth and I connect in, you know, a different way other than studying corpses, I suppose." Sweets blinked innocently, although he knew that neither of them had seen him. If they had, Booth would have threatened his life in that casual way of his- _I'll shoot you in between the eyes_- and that would have been the end of it. After all, the man _had_ shot a clown before.

"What kind of way?" Agent Booth's fingers began rapping at the sofa's arm, even as his pupils dilated significantly. The look of a guilty man. _And guilty he is_, Sweets mused cheekily.

"What Bones is trying to say is that it was something… different other than digging up bodies-"

"I actually don't dig up the bodies, Booth."

"Yeah, I know, but Sweets gets what I'm talking about."

"If you knew I didn't dig up bones, then why would you say so-?"

"Forget it, Bones."

"Fine," She shrugged. Sweets watched on with amusement.

"So, Booth, do you agree?"

"That she digs up bodies? That this is a complete waste of time?"

"Oh, come on. There had to be one thing you liked about painting with Dr. Brennan," Sweets offered to the conversation. Booth fidgeted in his seat and Brennan ran her hand along the couch's arm.

"Okay, fine, it was fun. I enjoyed it."

"Just fun?"

"Yeah. Why? What else is there to do but paint?"

_You tell me_, Sweets mused, but replied professionally with, "Did you talk?"

"Of course. We discussed the paint color, Parker, the new squint. Those types of things. Booth is very skilled in the painting department." Bones glanced over to her partner and let a small grin slip onto her face. She visioned those muscled arms, again, working up and down the wall, paint littering his shirtless form after rolling around with her on the floor. Her hand stroked the couch's arm again.

"Thank you, Bones." The partners shared a look.

"You're welcome," She then turned to Sweets, "In fact, we're going to do it again next weekend."

"But at my house this time," Booth chimed in. Sweets' jaw dropped to the floor.

"You're doing _what_ at his house?!" The partners shared another look, but this was of utter confusion.

"Painting, Sweets."

"Oh. Right. Yes, of course." Saved by the bell, a sudden ringing broke the awkward moment and Booth dove into his jacket pocket. His eyes flew across the text message and a small smile split across his face. Sweets groaned inwardly. Only one thing could excite Seeley Booth that much. _Besides Dr. Brennan_, a little voice added.

"Let's go, Bones!"

"Going to play Scrabble again?" Sweets called after the duo. Booth twisted towards the younger man, eyeing him oddly, before closing the door. Sweets heard a muffled question from Dr. Brennan and he assumed it was about his last outburst. Even so, he waited a full eight seconds- knowing they would be at the elevator by then- before bursting into a fit, grinning widely and scribbling madly down into his notebook.


End file.
